Annnnnd... I'm confused again.

[byelka58]

Graduate school has reduced me to such a level that I cannot even quit the thing correctly. To be fair, I was never any good at making decisions unless 1) I could flip a coin or 2) there were definitely no take-backs; i.e., the result was either unimportant or immediate. Leaving the program in two quarters' time, of course, is neither of those.

Comments

[byelka58]

I am not in the least surprised to find you in wholehearted agreement with the devil. If he had responded by whining out "bbbbbuuuutttt Rachel," I would have died laughing in his office, and that would have been the end of it.

But noooooo.

[vislius]

For what it's worth, I throw my two cents in in agreement with lilstrawburry and your advisor: a little perspective, by means of some time away to pursue whatever end you please, could do you some good. This particular option has also been recommended to me in the midst of my own grad school vacillations. At the end of this time, should you find yourself clamoring for Academia's hallowed halls, by all means, run back. And if, at the end, you find the idea of returning absolutely detestable, close the door on it and try another.

[byelka58]

My mom is being more than supportive of my "What if I were to move back home, and, uh, stuff?" Nothing to stop me from working a simple job to earn folk school and travel money, and cooking and cleaning for my rent.

Plus, awesome practice if I decide to pursue a career in sponging or hippieness. Which I feel could totally happen, at this rate.

[artnymph29]

This whole year-off thing also smacks of best-of-both-worlds convenience. You think you want to leave, so leave, but don't lose the opportunity to come back. Let's say you leave and then decide you want to come back, but have lost all of that fellowshipy goodness. That would, indeed, blow. Besides, it's not as if it's another year of school to think things over, so it's just delaying the actual quitting while reaping all of the benefits...and we know how attractive that is to a procrastinator :)

[byelka58]

Indeed, we know quite a bit about procrastinators.

Not all the benefits, really: they won't pay me (and my mom's insurance won't cover me) while I'm out of school. But of course you are completely right that, should I so desire, I can disappear the whole year, as if it had never been. I am my own Ministry of Information!

[prettymusic]

Ditto to all uttered above.

While I didn't exactly take a "leave of absence" my final semester in undergrad, I did do a program that got me basically out of the classroom and into the field that I wanted to be in. That way when I started law school this year, facing another 4 years of classes, I had some idea of what I was heading towards. And it was a refreshing break from the tedium of papers!

So: find some cool job that really appeals to you (and don't limit yourself to Chicago--either abroad or here in DC would be great, too!) and go for it for a year. Then you can make a better decision, especially after talking to people working with you to see what sort of education they have or have found to be common/useful.

[byelka58]

You are more career-oriented than I, I think. If I take a year off, it will be because I have no idea what I'm doing, not because I'm in such a hurry to begin. Your point stands, though; you had me from "the tedium of papers."

[gabbiana]

1) I just watched, on my *computer,* because after years and years of prowess at petty thievery of mp3s, I have finally discovered that by changing my search option to "video," I can, um, download videos, this episode of South Park, so my brain is thinking in sing-song and punctuating everything with "dum dum dum dum dum," eg "Rachel, Rachel, is so clever, la la la la la." You've been warned

[byelka58]

I'm going to reply separately, so that if you choose to reply, you must also do so twice, and thus my comment count rises ever higher. For reasons not particularly clear to me, I feel that downloading videos would be stealing. The mp3s I'm just... borrowing. I don't know. This paragraph's topic sentence was "Rachel has shaky ethical principles."

As for batshit insanity, a book I read for this week's History of Science meeting spends quite a lot of time looking at the thought processes behind various conceptions of what science should be. In contrasting the experimentalist and non-experimentalist viewpoints, though, the authors fail to mention that the former were constantly handling mercury with bare hands. Perhaps they were rational when they started. But one wonders.

The other book is surprisingly expensive, but I suppose that explains the liberal obsession with libraries. I have UC's copy.

And don't call me a blogger. Bloggers whine to strangers. I prey upon my friends and relations. This sentence belongs in the first

[gabbiana]

I get around the "videos = thievery" thing by deleting the files after I'm through watching. I tell myself that it's so I can still "support the artists," but really it's because the files are friggin' huge.

Both of those books are surprisingly expensive; one and a half years out of college, I'd forgotten how pricey even lib arts text books are. My books are still more expensive link it.

Blogger! Blogger! Nyah-nyah-nyah-nyah-blogger!

[byelka58]

Yep, that's the first book we read in the class. Look for a rant on the paradigm model of change in my next entry, should it ever appear.

You're the blogger. Friends don't let friends project.